Dead end hero
by Smudje
Summary: Jane and Lisbon at crossroads that could bring them apart.


**Disclaimer: I don't own them.**

**A/N: It's a dark little story that makes Patrick Jane realize some things about life. No romance not even if you squint.**

**I rate this K+. If you think I should change I will. Rating is really hard.  
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**Dead end hero**

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„Lisbon?, he asked anxiously."

She looked up at him. Locking eyes. They didn't shine with fire and life today.

„I'm tired!, she answered."

He had never seen her so drained. Emotionally drained. But unlike every time when it came to reading himself he wasn't blind today. He was the cause for her tiredness. Her eyes were so tired and vulnerable. She didn't make an effort to hide it. Her emotions. He opened his mouth to speak but her hand silenced him immediately. She straightened, released a tired breath and turned away from him slowly. Her heart was still beating furiously. Her palms were still sweaty. And her hands still shook when the leos' came in to process the scene. A petite brunette woman, blood dripping from her right arm. Motionless. Caught in her own dark thoughts. Numb even. A blond curly man without his hundred watt smile today. Some angry cuts in his handsome face and a bruise forming around hie left eye and definitely a concussion. A broken wrist an a graze on his abdomen that was bleeding but was not life threatening. He looked anxious. Nervous even. Furious and desperate. Darkness leaking from him. Holding a gun.

The room shattered. Bathed in blood. A chair in the middle. Chains on it to restrain its occupant.

Lisbon left. She just walks from the scene. Discarding her gun on the way out somewhere in a corner of that room. Simply leaving the most current evidence for her insanity behind. Why can't she let go when she should? Why must she always play the dead end hero?

Someone follows her out. She doesn't care. Till this someone dares to invade her private space. Again. Especially after what he did. How could he dare try to reason with her?

„Lisbon!" His voice is raw from emotion and unshed tears.

„Lisbon. I'm sorry."

She can't help but smile bitterly. When she turns around to face him her eyes still look tired maybe even more than before and it tears at his heart. When she right out laughs at him he is concerned and confused. He loves to be the cause to make Lisbon laugh but he hates that sound right now. Because it sounds bitter and hopeless. And has an air of finality about it. He involuntarily starts shaking his head. Slowly at first but more forceful when the truth of that sound settles in his tired brain. She let's him go. She gives up on him. No. He is scared of what that truth causes inside of him. An emotional turmoil he is not ready for. He is shocked to find that he, the person that didn't want to get attached to anybody ever again, whose only goal is to end the life of his familys' killer and if necessary go with him, can't imagine the petite woman to let go of him. He was shocked to find that he needed her to keep believing in him. Someone who didn't see him become a killer. Someone who believed to be able to fix him. He realized that deep down he hoped to be handed a different fate. The one Lisbon impersonated. It hit him like a truck. He needed Lisbon to be the glimmer of hope at the end of a very dark tunnel. His chance to take another road. So he stood in front of her. Trying to block out that joyless, bitter and hopeless laughter. Shaking his head furiously as he realized all of it, as he tried to take it all in. He was screaming no in his head. Suddenly he realized that it had developed sound and made its way out of his thoughts into spoken reality.

„No!"

Then Cho walked up to them. His stoic features weren't so stoic anymore after seeing his friends, his family at such a significant crossroads. After a scene that wasn't quite new. Lisbon running for Jane's aid after disobeying her orders to stay away until the team arrived. Until they had evidence. And he ignored it in his hatred and blindly ran into a trap he almost paid with his life. Lisbon was right as always. Jane loses his insight the moment Red John is in the game. So he ran into his trap blindly. Laughing Lisbon's warnings off. Without her he would be dead by now and that without taking that bastard with him. And this time they could have had him if he had played by the rules. Lisbon got shot by trying to save his ass again. But Red John chose the escape instead of taking them out. Gone. Again. And this time Jane could only blame himself.

Cho put a soothing hand on his boss' shoulder guiding her to the waiting ambulance leaving Jane to fend for himself. The EMTs took Jane with them. Lisbon didn't visit Jane. She had been released on the same day. It was a flesh wound. Whereas Jane had to stay for a day. The team had been there. Lisbon hadn't. The only reason he had been fighting hospital so much was because he needed to go after Lisbon. To start making it right. He wasn't ready to be who she saw him, maybe he'll never be but he needed her to believe. Selfish as it sounded. But he wanted to start giving something back. To not leave her be a dead end hero.

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Please read and review......

Oh and the mistakes are mine but I appreciate you pointing them out to me if you feel bothered by them.

The title is from the band End of Green "dead end hero"


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